Pics of the apartment - part 2!

I've been MIA for a few days due to a fabulous vacation in Sanibel! Mike and I met with my mom and dad for a long weekend last week. With everything that's happened in the last 2 months, it felt so wonderful to have a relaxing vacation!

Now, Mike is actually in Minneapolis for a couple days of training back at GM headquarters. If you're a GM employee reading this and see him tomorrow at the MGO - it's not his doppelganger!

Since I'm by myself, I've been a cleaning machine - and had the ambition to get the place photo ready (well, as close as it's going to get...) So, here is our final installment of new apartment pictures!



Living room: You can barely see it, but note our "garden" on the window sill...and our slightly empty wall above the couch: hopefully to be filled with art and pictures found in the area!



Kitchen (To understand the layout: I'm standing in pretty much the same spot to take this picture and the living room picture, just turned around. The whole area is very open. Dining area is to the left.)



Den/Office - still on the hunt for new curtains for some color...



Fav new coffee shop

In an effort to change my surroundings, I've been trying out a new local coffee shop: Feine. Mike and I had found it when we were out here apartment searching, and I think it's going to be my new favorite haunt!

It's an old home turned into a coffee shop with lots of antique furniture and a great Chai Latte. :) It also acts as a quasi gallery with local artists' work for sale on the walls. A local coffee shop with free wifi and an ever changing art gallery = my new favorite spot!

Let the birthday weekend begin!

Yesterday: dinner at Teresa's Cafe where Mike found a fabulous new beer. Today: downtown Philly!

Pics of the apartment - part 1

This weekend we finished up a number of "finishing touches" on the apartment. Here are the first few pics!


Bedroom: It's hard to make out from the picture, but I'm super excited about the purple velvet drapes!




Dining room (kitchen is to the right).



Bar (in the front entry)

Bath



More bath

 More to come!

The barstools made it!

Nemo!

We are luckily out of the way of the first big nor'easter to hit since we've been in PA: we're getting a lot of rain, and likely some snow tonight, but nothing like what is hitting Boston.

Naming it after my favorite Disney character is taking the punch out of the storm though...

Morning row...

My view out the window this morning...I wonder where they're rowing from?

Furniture shopping success!

Mike and I were excited to spend this weekend working on cleaning and starting to decorate! The boxes and packing supplies were removed from our apartment yesterday, so we were ready to go.

Today we went to Manayunk - a northern Philly suburb most similar to Uptown in Minneapolis. We actually looked at housing there, so spent time there on our apartment search weekend, and loved the ecclectic mix of stores and restaurants. We were going to take the opportunity to use the train the first time, but it was down for maintenance this weekend, so instead drove. Good thing: we had treasures to bring home!

We had seen a cute Morrocan store our first time, and went in today - and found an incredible new side table!

 

Mike carried it back to our parking spot:

 

We also found our bar stools! (Pictures to come after they're delivered on Wednesday.)

To spend some time discussing our furniture options, we stopped at the Manayunk Bewery - another local place that brews their own craft beer. The location is in an old building down by the river, and included marks on the wall where the water line hit during big hurricanes.

Time to get back to setting up the place!